The World Health Organization reports that 1.1 billion people are at an increased risk for noise-induced hearing loss, generated by exposure to excessive sound levels from personal mp3 devices and very loud settings such as clubs, bars, concerts, and sporting events. An projected 26 million Americans currently suffer from the condition. If noise-induced hearing loss […]
If we really want to understand hearing loss, we have to understand both the physical side, which makes hearing progressively more difficult, and the psychological side, which includes the lesser-known emotional reactions to the loss of hearing. Jointly, the two sides of hearing loss can wreak havoc on a person’s quality of life, as the […]
Many people are surprised to discover how young the discipline of audiology actually is, and how recently its founding father founded the profession. To put this in perspective, if you desired to find the founding father of biology, as an example, you’d have to go back in time by 2,300 years and read the The […]
When it’s time to shop for a car, most of us know exactly what to do. We carry out some research, compare options, and compile a list of questions to ask the dealership. We do this so that by the time we’re ready to stop by the dealership, we have an idea of what we’re […]
You’ve without doubt heard that today’s hearing aids are “not your father’s hearing aids,” or that hearing aid technology is light-years ahead of where it used to be, even as recently as 5 to 10 years ago. But what makes today’s technologies so much better? And what exactly can modern-day hearing aids achieve that couldn’t […]
At times, it seems as if we love to mislead ourselves. Wikipedia has an entry named “List of common misconceptions” that includes hundreds of widely-held but false beliefs. Yes, I know it’s Wikipedia, but take a look at the bottom of the page and you’ll notice around 385 references to credible sources. As an example, […]
You have just concluded your hearing test. The hearing instrument specialist is now coming into the room and provides you with a graph, like the one above, except that it has all of these characters, colors, and lines. This is supposed to present to you the exact, mathematically precise characteristics of your hearing loss, but […]
We don’t need to explain to you the symptoms of hearing loss; you already know them all too well. You have a different type of problem: persuading someone you care about to get their hearing checked and treated. But how are you supposed to get through to someone who denies there is even a problem, […]
It takes the average person with hearing loss 5 to 7 years before getting a qualified professional diagnosis, despite the fact that the signs and symptoms of hearing loss are transparent to others. But are those with hearing loss merely too stubborn to get help? No, actually, and for a couple of specific reasons. Maybe […]
Even though the majority of us stay current with our yearly physical, dental cleaning, and eye exam, we usually forget to take into account the health of our hearing. And when our hearing does start to worsen, it appears so slowly that we scarcely notice and fail to take action. It’s this lack of interaction […]
